The Impact Ladder is a conversational career podcast for technical people who want to grow their business impact.
Each episode, we sit down with someone who influences commercial outcomes in tech companies, startups, or technical ecosystems. Through the conversation, we trace their climb: the roles, the inflection points, and crucially, the skills and habits they deliberately built along the way. Because nobody moves up the ladder by accident.
The through-line: as you became more impactful in your career, what did you have to change in yourself?
Our goal of the podcast is to extract the hard won lessons learned by our guests that can help the next generation of people up-and-coming in their career in tech-oriented companies.
Mike Gutierrez - Director of Solution Consulting @ GoTo
In this episode we have Mike Gutierrez on, Director of Solution Consulting at GoTo (formerly LogMeIn) and author of More Than a Demo. Mike walks us through a career that started on the sales floor at Circuit City and moved into IT, where he worked up to a director role. A sales rep told him he'd make a great SE, and he took a step down to become one at GoTo, where he has spent the last 12 years growing from individual contributor to director. Mike shares why he coaches his team on discovery more than demos, how AI-informed buyers are changing the trust-building side of the sale, and why SEs should fight for the "no" to disqualify bad-fit deals early. He also explains how to run a tight, time-boxed POC that brings hidden decision makers to the surface, and what he learned helping ICs move into management, and sometimes back out of it. He also shares where he sees the SE role heading as technical selling takes center stage.
Mike's links:
Get More Than a Demo here: https://morethanademo.com/the-book/ (https://morethanademo.com/the-book/)
Connect with mike here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-gutierrez-solutions-consulting/ (https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-gutierrez-solutions-consulting/)
Andrew's links:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrewmcburney22/
(https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrewmcburney22/)https://elderado.ca (https://elderado.ca)
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Have a guest to recommend? Reach out to Andrew on LinkedIn - always happy to connect.
8 Oct 2026
Rob Cairns - Chief Technologist @ Stunning Digital Marketing
In this episode we have Rob Cairns on, CEO, founder and Chief Technologist at Stunning Digital Marketing. Rob walks us through a tech career that started on his dad's Apple II Plus and punch cards, moved through COBOL programming in the insurance industry, and led to 21 years in tech support at Women's College Hospital and Sunnybrook before he launched his own agency 16 years ago. Rob shares how he grew from building WordPress websites into a full-stack marketing agency, why getting clients to know their numbers matters more than a "pretty" website, and how firm contracts and boundaries have helped him run a business he enjoys. He also gets into how AI is reshaping web security for small businesses, and offers advice for anyone looking to follow a similar path.
Rob's links:
https://stunningdigitalmarketing.com/
(https://stunningdigitalmarketing.com/)Rob’s Podcast: https://stunningdigitalmarketing.com/podcast/
(https://stunningdigitalmarketing.com/podcast/)https://x.com/robcairns
(https://x.com/robcairns)https://www.linkedin.com/in/robcairns67/
Andrew's links:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrewmcburney22/
(https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrewmcburney22/)https://elderado.ca (https://elderado.ca)
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Have a guest to recommend? Reach out to Andrew on LinkedIn - always happy to connect.
4 Sept 2026
Kris Holt, Solutions Architect @ Red Hat
In this episode we have Kris Holt on, a Solutions Architect at Red Hat currently focused on the AI space. Kris shares a career path that started in a JPMorgan Chase mortgage call center right out of high school, ran through a contractor role in a data center that ended in him getting let go, and worked its way up through IT help desk and application support before he landed at Red Hat in 2021. He opens up about the eight years it took to finish his cloud computing degree at WGU while working full time, how often he got counted out of jobs for not having a degree despite knowing he could do the work, and how he went from dreading presentations to showing up at a partner event in an inflatable Mario costume, which is still the presentation people bring up to him two years later. Kris also gets into how he's using AI to learn about AI, why he's finally let go of needing to know everything in favour of specializing, and the Simon Sinek book that changed how he frames every conversation with a partner.
Kris's links:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/kristofer-holt/
Andrew's links:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrewmcburney22/
(https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrewmcburney22/) https://elderado.ca
(https://elderado.ca)
Like content like this? Subscribe to keep up to date.
Have a guest to recommend? Reach out to Andrew on LinkedIn - always happy to connect.
5 Aug 2026
Justin Gammage Director, Industry Partnerships @ University of Miami Frost Co-Founder @ Illuminex.ai
This episode features Justin Gammage, co-founder of Illuminex AI, an airfield inspection startup, and Director of Partnerships at the University of Miami's Frost Institute for Data Science and Computing. He came up as a material science PhD and spent his early career at General Motors before pivoting into the partnership-building work he does today.
On this episode, we cover:
How Justin went from troubleshooting problems on the GM assembly plant floor to running research collaborations with universities, and what he had to unlearn to shift from manufacturing certainty to research "what-ifs."
Why selling into airports is slow: 18–24 month sales cycles, unpaid pilots, and a decision chain that can run 10 people deep at a major hub.
The mindset that runs through everything he does: you're never selling to "Toronto Pearson," you're selling to one person whose mortgage and next raise ride on your project delivering.
Networking tips from a self-described introvert who finds it genuinely hard to walk up to strangers, including his two go-to moves for surviving a conference room full of people he doesn't know.
The 2008 financial crisis wake-up call that reshaped how he thinks about his career, plus the mentor "aha moment" that taught him partnerships live or die on whether people actually like working together.
Justin’s Links
https://www.linkedin.com/in/justin-gammage-846bb613/ (https://www.linkedin.com/in/justin-gammage-846bb613/)
https://www.illuminex.ai/ (https://www.illuminex.ai/)
https://idsc.miami.edu/justin-gammage/
(https://idsc.miami.edu/justin-gammage/)
Andrew’s links:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrewmcburney22/
https://elderado.ca
Like content like this?
Subscribe to keep up to date.
Have a guest to recommend? Reach out to Andrew on Linkedin - always happy to connect.
23 Jul 2026
John Patton - SVP @ High Tide Consulting, Inc. Ex Salesforce, Director of Solution Engineering
In this episode we have John Patton on, a Senior VP of AI and Data solutions at High Tide Consulting Inc. on. John shares what he learned from a 12 year journey at Salesforce starting as a Solution Engineer and ending his time there as a Senior Director of Solution Engineering while leading a team. John also gets into how he’s approaching conversations with customers at his current company to help them uncover and adopt new cutting edge agentic AI flows by leveraging the Salesforce ecosystem within higher ed and non profits environments.
John’s links:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/pattonj/
Andrew’s links:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrewmcburney22/
https://elderado.ca Like content like this?
Subscribe to keep up to date.
Have a guest to recommend? Reach out to Andrew on Linkedin - always happy to connect.
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